Intruders can tap into optical fiber transmission lines and steal information by either bending a segment or segments of the fiber or by stretching (i.e. tapering) a segment or segments of the fiber via application of heat to enable reading and interpreting the signal energy escaping from that fiber. While there are other methods of tapping information out of optical fibers, taps based on fiber bending or stretching are easy to implement, effective, and can be hard to detect. Tapping valuable data transmitted over the world wide optical fiber infrastructure is a threat to every major industry and government organization and, in particular, larger organizations utilizing multiple facilities. While these organizations may be able to secure optical fiber cables within their own facilities, they generally have much less control over the optical fiber cable links between those facilities.
The vulnerabilities of optical fibers to tapping and, in particular, tapping by bending or stretching of the fiber, leaves many organizations susceptible to data theft. Such data theft could lead to leaking of confidential information, thereby causing harm to the entity transporting data over optical fibers. In the business context, leaking of information, such as marketing strategies or developmental technologies may ultimately result in damage to profits. In the governmental context, leaking of information related to national security may endanger the lives or citizens. Existing solutions face challenges in detecting and preventing tapping of optical fibers.
It is generally believed that data encryption can secure data transmitted over a fiber link usually implemented using high level Advanced Encryption Standard (AES). This approach neglects, however, the fact that while the data payload is encrypted, the IP header information that guides the data packets around the internet is not, revealing both the source and destination of each packet, therefore revealing information about any message sent over the internet.
It would therefore be advantageous to provide a solution that would overcome the deficiencies of the prior art.